Hearthpwn

-NEWEST-

-1 Loot Hoarder +1 Ice Barrier

-1 Acolyte of Pain + Ice Barrier

-UPDATE #1-

Added more delay , removed 2x Twlight Drake for 2x Blizzard

-UPDATE#2-

Removed Crazed Alchemist for Flamestrike as it is just more consistent & you will win more due to board clear & delay

-UPDATE#3-

Removed 1x Flamestrike & Added 1x Polymorph , having 1 polymorph is mainly for playing against super control with big taunts. Just the 1 polymorph even two can win you the game playing into late game against a druid.

The reason I removed the Pyroblast was because its just too expensive and once you reach this far into late game you will most likely have many ways of dealing 10+ damage anyway. The Crazed Alchemists were added for the combo of twilight drakes to easily deal 8+ damage on a turn to get closer to your insane late game burst. Since you have so much filtering through card draw this combo is extremely easy to pull it off & I do it almost every game.

Info:

Giants mage use to be played a long time back when mage wasn't nerfed. I honestly think its still playable and is much better then hand lock & the reason for this is because with giants mage you can do the powerful 2x molten giant + frost nova combo which is just insane. Most of the time its insanely difficult to remove 2 giants & only 1. The difference between handlock & this giants mage deck is the burst potential in this deck is much greater. You have fireballs , ice bolts + ice lance combos which other classes don't have. That is the reason mage does it so well due to the insane burst.

How to play:

Your goal is to control the early game with freezes & using doomsayer effectively to control the board. You want to use your arcane intellects , novice engineers & loot hoarders whenever you can to filter out the deck & draw the cards you need ( ice block , drakes , giants, fireballs etc ) A lot of people tend to use doomsayer only with a freeze which is completely wrong. If you play doomsayer on turn 2-4 when they may only have 1-2 minions its completely fine, even if it does get destroyed you saved yourself taking extra damage + you are delaying the game even more which is what you want to do. Your whole goal is to delay the game till you can get your combos out play your giants then klll them in 1 or 2 turns. 

Opening Hands:

Usually I like to have loot hoarders , novice , arcane intellect in my hand to filter out the deck & draw the cards that I need so I don't draw these on turn 8 or something when something like loot hoarder isn't as great as turn 2 or 3. It's good to have 1 iceblock in your hand as even throughout turn 5-7 you may not get it when you need it the most, also playing iceblock on turn 3 when the board is completely empty and you have nothing else to play is great! You don't have to wait till another turn to play it when you may want to combo them or play a blizzard instead, so I tend to keep iceblock if its in my starting hand. Don't be afraid to keep high mana cost spells too like blizzard! This is amazing against aggro and can win you the game especially if you have coin & can play it turn 5.

Matchups

Druid: 

This matchup isn't really that hard, druids are typically mid game or either super slow & late game and this is what you need, they don't normally have big plays till turn 5 with druid of the claw and turn 7 with ancient of war, slow decks is what you excel at playing against. Playing against the extremely popular force of nature savage roar combo is useless against this as you have iceblock & they need to wait till turn 9 to play it unless they have innervate & even if they do have innervate they are too slow to most likely kill you at turn 7 or 5 compared to a rogue or warlock.

Rogue:

Easiest matchup ever..In the meta right now Rogues do not run assasinate most of the time so playing giants is amazing! They usually run 1 sap max & if they sap something like a molten giant so what you probably played it for around 0-4 anyway so playing it next turn is fine & they need to deal with it next turn. Also if you play against miracle rogues it could be an issue with conceal as this deck does not run flamestrike which you can add by replacing a blizzard for it or removing pyroblast which isn't too necessary as you have enough burst anyway. Also playing against miracle rogues they delay the game till turn around 6-7 when they can gadgetzan + cold blood & conceal prep etc w/e which is all these free turns for you to get into late game. Rogues don't have any armor or heals which is amazing. If you have the chance to fireball them in the face it is completely fine as long as you aren't playing against a control I would save it incase you need it in the future.

Paladin:

Who plays paladin.. Paladin is probably the 2nd hardest match up warrior being first, paladins have lots of heals which can really ruin your burn. The best way to play this match up is to alex them on turn 9 if possible & not waste fireballs to the face , ice bolts , ice lances because in the end this could be useless if they just heal up with lay on hands & holy light + guardian of kings which is a tremendous amount of health. Aggro paladin is not a great matchup either as you normally have 7+ cards on you and divine favour will be HUGE value for them. I've had this happened to me several times & I have to say it is not a good feeling giving them 5+ cards for only 3 mana.

Warrior:

This matchup is really really hard, if they have armor smiths and have a whirlwind combo then its gonna suck because bursting them down is going to take a long time. Armor up completely destroys your burst which is basically a fireball or half of the damage from a giant. In this matchup make sure you keep there armor down so they don't shield slam your drakes or giants! Brawl is also really anoyying because if you have 2 giants out maybe a drake only 1 is going to be left & they may have tink master execute or shield slam available which could cost you the game due to no burst left. Warriors also tend to run alexstraza a lot so if they are at 20 health and you want to fireball fireball for example make sure you have some way of killing them in another turn.

Mage:

Mage does pretty good due to polymorphs , ice bolts etc. If one of the players has counter spells this could easily win you the game counter spelling a big threat spell like flame strike, blizzard , polymorph, fireball etc can eaisly put the game in ones favour. Even though polymorphs sound bad you have alex , drakes & 4 giants to remove which is extremely tough but mage deals with it better then any other class.

Shaman:

This match up can be really frustrating as earth shock can 1 shot your drakes, they have hex's which every single shaman runs 2 but they have no heals which is a plus. Match up isn't that bad throw out your giants/drakes ASAP and burn the hex's they have in there hand so you don't need to worry as much about playing a big creature on your next possible turn. If you can delay the board enough and whittle there health down you will easily win late game no problem as you have answers to killing them in a hundred ways. ( Ice bolt + ice lance + Ice lance + fireball combo , with an alex turn before that ) Throwing fireballs at their face & eventually killing them with pyroblast or leeroy + giants.

Hunter:

Matchup is kind of easy. Usually you play 1 big creature at a time which is easy for them to deadly shot, lots of them run owls which is really good for drakes but this matchup isn't too bad. You can easily burst them down as they have no sorts of heals & there only answer is really farseers but who plays control hunter. Ice block stops them from wanting to combo you or they will fail there combo if they try it on you. So many games i've won the game just because I needed 1 or 2 turns and ice block won it for me.

Priest:

No one plays it & if they do it dosen't matter. They have really crappy removal , they can't mind control your minions till turn 10. Their hero power isn't enough to let them survive through your burst. Your iceblock isn't really even needed as they can't OTK you like other classes ( druid, shaman, hunter ) So if you have 15 health and they have around 6 damage on the board you won't have to be as scared and in desperate of iceblock as playing against another classes. Overall easy matchup take some damage from their minions to throw out molten giants , play drakes as soon as you can as they can't shadow word pain/death it. Priests are super super late game which is great for you.

This is my first guide and please tell me what I need to fix I could even make some videos on it. I am bad at explaining but I hope in the best possible way I told you how to play it & the matchups! My skype is "buxtonnnn" if any details about the deck are needed I will gladly answer your questions!

- Cards to replace

-1 Leeroy +1 Flame Strike ( Don't really need Leeroy and flame strike is a great addition to the deck )

-1 Bloodmage Thalnos +1 Kobold Geomancer

-1 Nat Pagle +1 Loot Hoarder/Coldlight Oracle

-1 Alexstrasza +1 Flamestrike or +1 Doomsayer ( both great for control, I wouldn't recommend playing this deck without Alex but it still works , Alex is like the biggest part about it )

-1 Pyroblast +1 Loot Hoarder / Coldlight Oracle ( Don't need pyro you have enough burst but it can always be nice to finish them off as most people think pyro isn't run anymore )

Thanks 

~ Teekk

Battletag: Teek#1928 (NA Server)

Skype:buxtonnnn